Liam Smith Ready To Become First Family World Champ

Liam Smith is confident he will become the first of the famous boxing brothers to claim world champion status.

Smith takes on America's John Thompson for the vacant WBO light-middleweight title in Manchester on Saturday night.

Eldest brother Paul failed in two world-title attempts against Arthur Abraham, Stephen will fight holder Jose Pedraza for the IBF super-featherweight strap and the youngest, Callum, is being tipped by many to be the best of the four - but unbeaten Liam (20-0-1-KO10) is ready to become the first world champion.

"Yes I am... 100 percent!" he told Sky Sports.

"I'm expecting the best John Thompson, I'd be a fool to expect anything less. He's fighting for the world title so we're prepared for the best John Thompson.

"My preparation has gone brilliantly. My weight is down, I think we are going to leave no stone unturned, we're going into it having covered everything.

"What's going to happen is I beat John Thompson, so I'll be the first of us brothers to be a world champion."

The WBO belt has been left vacant following a dispute between former holder Demetrius Andrade and the governing body, with Michel Soro supposed to be the first person Smith would face to fight for a world title.

But international issues forced the Frenchman to pull out, leaving Thompson (17-1-KO6) to step in six weeks ago.

The American has never been in a 12-round fight before and although he lost to Frank Galarza with a second-round knockout last January, the Liverpool lad is still expecting the toughest fight of his own career at the Manchester Arena.

"It's a different fight but it's still a world title fight," he said.

"I am expecting a tough fight but I have seen a lot of him.

"He won quite a decent tournament over in America which was obviously televised so there's bits of footage and we've done some homework - I've left that to Joe [Gallagher] and my management team - and they've seen enough of him to sort out the preparation right."